Lost baggage blues will be over by March 2008: BA

Mumbai, Oct 18 (UNI) The British Airways is working on a mechanism to sort out the lost baggage blues that the passengers face across the globe by March 2008.

''Come March 28, 2008, and the lost baggage blues that face the passengers travelling with the British Airways across the globe, will be a thing of the past,'' said Gavin Halliday, Area Commercial Manager (Middle East, Asia and Pacific) of the airline while talking to reporters during the unveiling of the new-look cabin 'New World Club' here today.

''We are working on the mechanism to sort out this problem, and once our integrated terminal at the Heathrow airport comes into being, the lost baggage cases would hardly be there,'' he said.

According to Mr Halliday, the airline was in the process of integrating both the terminals -- Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 -- into one single terminal.

While the Terminal 1 is used for short haul flights, the latter is used for long-haul flights. The new integrated terminal will be known as Terminal 5.

''With the opening of the Terminal 5 in 2008 at London's Heathrow Airport, a new concept lounge for Club World Passengers will be introduced. The flagship lounge will maximise the space available and meet the diffrent needs of both short-haul and long-haul passengers,'' Mr Halliday said.

In April this year, British Airways was listed as one the 24 worst major European airlines for losing passengers' baggage in 2006 in a report by the Air Transport Users' Council (AUC).

Quoting airlines' own data, the report had stated that the major European network airlines mishandled over 5.6 million bags in 2006.

''This figure, however, relates only to the twenty-four airlines that are members of the Association of European Airlines,'' the report had said.

UNI